Woo, I finally finished Super Metroid tonight, after taking 8 hours and 42 minutes, and collecting 86% of all items, according to the post-game stats. I’m sure it could have been done more efficiently, but I’m happy to have finally completed it at all. There wasn’t really a lot left to do, just to get the screw attack, a couple more energy tanks and miscellaneous ammo increases, a couple more bosses, and the final boss.

Ridley and Mother Brain were tougher fights than I expected, knocking me down to my last energy tank in both cases (though I had unused reserve tanks, at least). I lost a bit too much health on the way to MB and let a few too many super missiles get wasted while fighting the pseudo-Metroids on the way to her, and had trouble dodging the lasers in her room, which accounted for most of the trouble. I think I started the MB fight proper with only five or six energy tanks left, of fourteen.

So, how did I celebrate this victory? By going and buying three more games on the Wii’s Virtual Console, of course. Super Mario Bros: The Lost Levels, available in North America for the first time (aside from the enhanced version in All Stars); Landstalker, an interesting-looking isometric RPG for the Genesis; and Neutopia, a suspiciously-similar clone of the original Zelda. I’d never even heard of the latter two before, but got them based on forum recommendations.

I’m not sure what game is next, though. Time to finish off the night with some more Picross DS…